Hartford shouldn’t rely on burning trash. Here’s why.

By Mandy Gunasekara

Special to Hartford Courant|

Sep 13, 2019 | 6:00 AM

With the mechanical failures of two turbines at the regional refuse-to-energy plant on Hartford's Maxim Road in January 2018, about 20,000 tons of trash piled up inside the facility and the backlog caused problems for garbage haulers and their customers in many communities. (Patrick Raycraft / Hartford Courant)

Hartford is at a crossroads when it comes to waste management. The perpetual breakdowns of the South Hartford trash incinerator have presented the local community with the option of keeping the aging technology on life-support or embracing another approach less prone to breakdown.

In making this decision, community leaders and taxpayers have the opportunity to better prioritize cost effectiveness, environmental soundness and the safety of surrounding communities when considering other options.

Advertisement

The South Hartford incinerator has been the focus of significant criticism. After almost 30 years of operations, the facility is very near its initial end-of-life status, and each “catastrophic equipment failure” serves as a stark reminder. These incidences not only create putrid nuisances in the form of rotting piles of trash but also come at a high cost. The November 2018 breakdown reportedly cost $15 million, which resulted in a 15.3 percent increase in fees for the member cities and towns.

High costs and negative impacts to the local community are nothing new for the trash incineration industry. Most were built in the 1970s and 1980s and are now dealing with the question of how to prolong their end-of-life reality. In response, the industry has spent significant resources investing in a new image and a new name. Politicians, lobbyists and many in the media refer to the trash burning facilities by their newer, more innovative name, “waste-to-energy.”

In an effort to repair crumbling reputations, these facilities have added heat-capturing capabilities as a means to produce energy. This process is a step in the right direction, but has proved both inefficient and extremely costly in practice. It costs $8.33 per megawatt-hour to make energy out of waste incineration. For comparison, pulverized coal only costs $4.25 per megawatt-hour; nuclear energy costs $2.04.

Air pollutants are an inevitable by-product of the trash-burning process. While facilities have greatly reduced the release of traditional air pollutants like particulate matter and dioxins, there is recent concern that they are now releasing per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, more commonly referred to as PFAS. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency issued an action plan to address growing public concern. In the meantime, trash incinerators do not have the same level of pollution control capabilities for PFAS as they do other air pollutants.

For decades, these facilities were located near low-income, impoverished communities that historically proved easy to ignore. As some of these communities have found their voice and exposed higher rates of terminal illnesses and asthma, many cities and states are resisting high-dollar lobbying campaigns to keep these facilities operating and instead investing in longer-term sustainable materials management solutions.

The city of Hartford and surrounding areas are on the verge of making a waste management decision that will have decades-long impacts. Past decisions were made when the costs, environmental and health impacts of burning trash were not fully realized.

With improved understanding and a renewed focus on better handling materials, city leaders should turn away from the technologies of the past and invest in a healthier, more efficient future.

Mandy Gunasekara is the founder of ENERGY 45. She is the former Principal Deputy Assistant Administrator for the Office of Air and Radiation at the Environmental Protection Agency and also served as Majority Counsel on the United States Senate Environment and Public Works Committee.